Silver wasn't sure how long he was out, his eyes cracked open to find no less than eight unicorn children leaning over him.
"Izzee dead?"
"No way, he's movin!"
"He's a zompony! Run!" The children took off squealing, as a kind bright green pegasus appeared in his vision.
"Don't try to sit up yet. You'll trigger an aftershock." She said gently.
"Sarah?" He asked opening eyes and looked around. He hated dramatic finishes, but he should have known that he'd have gotten an attack from that. Without Angel at home or Lucy at work he was practically a cripple. "Have you seen my daughter, green, almost out of fillyhood... no cutie mark, earth pony?" Even if she wasn't, earth pony was just short for "No wings and no horn.".
"She was here, she couldn't find your wife, and brought you to the school nurse. She's a very bright young girl." The nurse said. "I believe she went home, she was going to search your things for painkillers." She said. "You were out for almost an hour, has this happened before?"
Silver smiled, however bad that speech had been, and how little comfort his fainting must have been to him, he knew that she was capable on her own.
"Yes, usually when I get agitated. My wife can cast a soothing charm, and at work I have someone to assist me with that." He had explained this many times before, but he was glad. He knew that Sarah would realize eventually that she was capable of many things. Little did he know that he was right.
Canterlot was no bigger than any pony being able to go from anyone building to another in less than half an hour. Sarah made the trip back to their house in record time. In her memory her father had never gotten an attack quite like that. Her mother had told her about them, but she'd never seen them herself. There was no one at home, but the magical door knew it was her and opened as soon as she pressed her hoof to it. The most logical place to search was in the bedroom, but there was nothing in all the drawers resembling vials for pills. Nor was there anything in the bathroom.
Silver was hurting, not dead, no, but hurting, and she was filled with guilt. Sarah had gotten the nurse immediately, the nearest qualified medical professional. Mentally she kicked herself for something that couldn't possibly have been her fault. "Stupid, stupid! Why couldn't I have been born a unicorn?! I could have sent a telepathic message to Mother... I could've gotten help faster!" She was raiding the room, drawers being flung open, desk being nearly turned inside out, checking under the bed, even under a loose floorboard that they used to hide emergency bits under. "Come on, come on!"
Nothing in either the bedroom or in the bathroom. Nor the living room, or kitchen, or in her mothers study. There weren't any stashed away in the hallway, or down in the basement. There was only one room that seemed to have any chance of holding them. Her father had never clearly worded that nopony was supposed to be in there period. The door was simple locked most of the time, magically. They had to knock to get him out, and when he did he rarely let anyone see inside. This time the door was ajar.
Sarah frowned. She was honest to a fault, she was a good filly, well almost a mare now, and normally would never think of intruding on places that she wasn't supposed to be in. But he hadn't technically said she wasn't supposed to be there. Huh. She slowly slipped inside, and closed the door behind her, flicking on the light. Maybe just a peek.
It was wall to wall, with.. blank pages? Blank pages mounted on on a board with stickers, blank pages in piles across the floor. There was a typewriter, with forty keys. And reams and reams of blank pages. Nothing readable on them at all. Not even a hint of ink, though there was an ink house all right. There was only a single sheet with anything written on it in the room lying next to the typewriter. She spotted a pill glass next to the typewriter.
Sarah had learned several tricks at sending coded communication with the Cutie Mark Crusaders. She'd spent so much time with them as a blank flank she'd already turned down two offers to be president. She just didn't feel right taking the position. She picked up the ink brush with her mouth, and slid the brush across one of the pages. Maybe it was invisible. Or lemon.
She drew a large thick wad of dark ink across the page. It lingered and then all of the sudden it fainted from being visible. Evidently what was in the ink house was ordinary ink. There were no means in the room of making the writing visible. There was however a fairly readable letter that had already been finished, lying next to the typewriter. The opened pill jar stood next to it.
Sarah paused, and moved over to the piece of paper with writing. She had an idea about the rest of it, but for now, start with the easy stuff. "Alright, Step One, lets see what we have." She was filled with guilt for not bringing pills to her father, but she was sure he was alright. he'd been having headaches for years, and curiosity was overwhelming.
The letter, having obviously been written on the typewriter was of a different sort of paper than the rest in the room. The texture was subtly different, more grainy and rough. She recognized it as a page from of the sort that she and her siblings would draw on. Her dad had probably run out of invisible paper, or maybe this was simple a draft.
From Silver Key, head of Evodian defense projects, to Iron Jaw:
First of all, I think we need to step up the security further. You're in the Evodian black ops, you don't get to think that something can be too paranoid anymore. While the invisible writing spell works fine, blank pages simple stand out and the spell is not invisible. We need to find a way to disguise secret documents as harmless documents. Getting back to the matter at hand I disagree entirely with your opinion about this. Whether a useful agent can be made out of someone so young, is something we can only find out by trying. No I won't tell you what the mission is for, but I know what the requirements are: No cutie mark. I can't underline this enough. It won't work with a cutie mark. Find someone who has been unable to get one, that should already narrow the list of candidates down. I'm not interested in race specifics, find someone with drive and motivation, who can be told a goal and pursue, and who's intelligent enough to follow through. I'm enclosing a list of candidates. They have already been sent a letter informing them of once-in-a-lifetime chance to serve. We've rented the Tragic theater's old decommissioned rooms as the training ground, and we'll advertise it as a training camp for aspiring actors. Set the whole thing up so that the candidates will arrive there in twenty days. Its short notice, but both Novaria and I feel that its time to step up this project. Stay sharp Iron Jaw, we might be trying to infiltrating them, but they've been at this game for a hundred times longer and they're ten times better at it."
Enclosed at the bottom was a list of names, with room to spare. He had never asked her if she wanted to be part of this. He hadn't even offered it in her moment of grief over her uselessness.
Sarah stared at it for a good long while, debating making up a fake name and address to add to the list. It wouldn't be that hard. She could just add an unused mailbox from the apartment complex, or something of that nature. Make up a fake name, get in on the project. She was angry that her father had never asked her, she would have accepted. Even if meant possible death, she would have accepted, anything to be part of a cause.
Now the sneaky part of her was kicking in. Writing invisible, paper not. Alright, so she just needed new, unenchanted paper. She left the closet, propping the door ajar to retrieve a few pieces of regular paper from her room. She took a pencil in her mouth, and placed her paper down over the enchanted paper, rubbing with the long edge of the graphite. "Unenchanted paper, lets see if we can't get a rubbing off this." It was worth a try.
It didn't work, the paper was different from whatever paper that particular draft had been written on. There was no sign of indentations from either key strokes, or from a pen. Her experiments gave no results, there was just the single drafted letter. It invited a fake name and a fake address. And this was her only chance to add it.
That had been her only idea, and she made no further hesitation in adding an address to a mailbox that she knew had been vacant for years, something about a horrible tragedy taking place in the house the mailbox belonged to. In moments, she had a name down.
Tumbleweed.
Sarah thought it was appropriate, she was always blowing aimlessly down empty roads, and had no real use. Maybe that could change now.